The moon hung full and bright over Konoha, casting silver light across rooftops and empty streets. Most of the village had long since retired for the night, leaving only the occasional patrol of ninja and the distant sounds of nocturnal creatures.
Naruto sat on the windowsill of his small apartment, staring out at nothing in particular. The four girls had finally left about an hour ago, after much reluctance and repeated assurances that they would return first thing in the morning. Satsuki had been the last to go, lingering at his doorway with an expression that seemed to war between wanting to stay and understanding that he needed space.
"Get some rest, okay?" she had said softly, reaching out to brush a strand of hair from his forehead. "Tomorrow's a big day. We're going to fix this whole graduation thing, I promise."
Naruto had nodded, not because he believed her or disbelieved her, but because nodding seemed to be the expected response.
Now, alone in the darkness of his apartment, he sat and observed the night. Sleep wouldn't come—it rarely did anymore. So he simply existed, watching the shadows shift as clouds drifted across the moon.
That was when he saw it.
A figure, moving rapidly across the rooftops several blocks away. The movement was furtive, hurried—not the casual patrol of a guard or the purposeful travel of a ninja on a mission. This was someone fleeing.
Naruto's eyes, sharpened by years of watching for threats, tracked the figure as it leaped from building to building. Silver hair glinted in the moonlight, and something large was strapped to the figure's back—a scroll, massive and clearly heavy.
Mizuki.
Naruto recognized him immediately. The false smile, the calculating eyes, the silver hair that seemed to glow in the darkness. And the scroll on his back—even from this distance, Naruto could see the distinctive markings of an official Konoha document. Something important. Something valuable.
Something stolen.
Seconds later, a group of chuunin appeared on the rooftops behind Mizuki, pursuing him with obvious urgency. Their shouts carried faintly on the night air.
"Stop! Mizuki, you're under arrest!"
"He's heading for the east gate!"
"Don't let him escape with the Scroll of Seals!"
The Scroll of Seals. Naruto had heard of it—a legendary document said to contain the most powerful and dangerous jutsu in the village's history. Techniques forbidden for various reasons, locked away to prevent misuse.
And Mizuki was stealing it.
Naruto watched the chase unfold, processing the information without any particular emotional response. Mizuki was a traitor. The village was in danger. A valuable artifact was being stolen.
These were facts. Observations. They didn't compel him to action any more than watching a bird fly past his window would.
But then another thought surfaced, rising from somewhere deeper than his usual detached observation.
The Scroll of Seals contains powerful jutsu.
Powerful jutsu could make me stronger.
Stronger means better able to survive.
Survival. That, at least, was something he still understood on a fundamental level. Not out of any desire to live, exactly, but simply because continuing to exist was the default state. Dying required effort, or at least circumstances beyond his control. Living just... happened.
And if living was going to happen regardless, being stronger seemed preferable to being weaker.
Naruto stood from the windowsill, his decision made without fanfare or internal debate. He would intercept Mizuki. He would take the scroll. He would learn whatever he could from it before returning it to the village.
Not out of loyalty to Konoha. Not out of hatred for Mizuki. Not out of any noble desire to be a hero.
Simply because it was an opportunity, and opportunities should be utilized.
He moved to his equipment pouch, checking that his kunai and shuriken were in place. Then, without hesitation, he slipped out the window and into the night.
Tracking Mizuki wasn't difficult.
The silver-haired traitor was fast, but he was also panicked, leaving obvious traces in his wake—broken tiles, disturbed branches, the faint scent of sweat and fear. The pursuing chuunin were close behind him, but Naruto took a different route, calculating Mizuki's trajectory and moving to intercept rather than follow.
Years of being hunted through these streets had given him an intimate knowledge of Konoha's layout. Every alley, every shortcut, every hidden path—he knew them all. Where Mizuki had to navigate around obstacles, Naruto slipped through gaps and shadows, taking a more direct route to the traitor's likely destination.
The forest beyond the east wall. Dense enough to lose pursuit, close enough to the border to facilitate escape. It was the logical choice for someone fleeing the village with stolen goods.
Naruto reached the treeline first, positioning himself in the shadows of a massive oak. He didn't have long to wait.
Mizuki burst from the village moments later, his breathing ragged, the massive scroll on his back bouncing with each desperate leap. He was focused entirely on escape, his attention fixed on the path ahead rather than his surroundings.
A tactical error.
Naruto stepped out of the shadows, directly into Mizuki's path.
The silver-haired traitor skidded to a halt, eyes widening in shock. "You—! The demon brat?!"
Naruto stood motionless, his face as blank as ever. "You stole the Scroll of Seals."
It wasn't a question. Just an observation.
Mizuki's surprise quickly shifted to something uglier—a twisted combination of contempt and calculation. His false smile returned, though it was more like a grimace now.
"So what if I did?" He straightened, adjusting the scroll on his back. "What are you going to do about it, monster? Run to your precious instructors? Oh wait—" his grin widened, "—you failed the exam, didn't you? You're not even a ninja. You're nothing. Just a worthless, demon-possessed failure."
The words washed over Naruto without effect. He had heard far worse, far more often, from far more people. Mizuki's insults were nothing special.
"You shouldn't call other people monsters," Naruto said flatly. "It's hypocritical."
Mizuki's eye twitched. "Hypocritical? Do you even know what you are? Do you know why the village hates you?" He leaned forward, his voice dropping to a venomous hiss. "It's because you're the Nine-Tailed Fox! The demon that attacked the village twelve years ago—it's sealed inside you! You ARE the monster, you stupid brat!"
He clearly expected this revelation to be devastating. Expected Naruto to crumble, to cry, to scream in denial.
Naruto just stared at him.
"I know," he said.
Mizuki blinked. "You... know?"
"The villagers aren't subtle. Neither are the whispers." Naruto tilted his head slightly. "I've known for years. It doesn't matter."
"Doesn't... matter?" Mizuki's composure cracked further. "You have a demon inside you! A monster that killed hundreds of people! And it doesn't MATTER to you?!"
"No."
The simple response seemed to infuriate Mizuki more than any emotional reaction could have. His face twisted with rage, and his hand moved to the giant shuriken strapped to his back—a fuma shuriken, massive and deadly.
"You really are a monster," he snarled. "A cold, empty, soulless monster. Well, I'll just have to put you down like the beast you are!"
He hurled the shuriken with expert precision, the massive blade spinning through the air toward Naruto's chest.
Naruto didn't move.
At the last possible moment, his hand came up in a blur, catching the shuriken by its central ring. The impact pushed him back slightly, his feet sliding in the dirt, but he absorbed the force without visible effort.
Mizuki's eyes widened. "How—"
Naruto examined the shuriken in his grip with mild curiosity. "You telegraphed the throw. And you aimed for center mass, which is predictable." He tossed the weapon aside, where it embedded itself in a tree trunk with a solid thunk. "If you're going to betray your village and steal forbidden jutsu, you should at least be competent at combat."
Mizuki's shock transformed back into fury. "You little—!" He drew two kunai and charged, closing the distance between them in seconds.
The fight that followed was brief, brutal, and entirely one-sided.
Mizuki was a chuunin, trained and experienced. In terms of pure technique, he should have been far beyond an Academy student who had failed his graduation exam.
But Naruto wasn't a normal Academy student.
Years of dodging thrown objects had given him reflexes that bordered on precognitive. Years of running from mobs had built his speed and stamina to exceptional levels. And years of quietly, relentlessly training in isolation had honed his body into something far more capable than anyone realized.
He couldn't perform a basic clone technique. But he could fight.
Mizuki's first kunai slash missed entirely, Naruto simply not being where the blade expected him to be. The second was deflected by a kunai of his own, drawn so quickly that Mizuki didn't even see the motion. The third was caught—actually caught, Naruto's hand closing around Mizuki's wrist with crushing force.
"You're slow," Naruto observed. "And your form is sloppy. You've been relying on intimidation and deception rather than actual skill."
He twisted, and Mizuki's wrist made a sound that was definitely not healthy. The chuunin screamed, dropping his kunai.
Naruto released him, stepping back as Mizuki clutched his injured wrist.
"You—you can't—" The silver-haired traitor was panting, sweat dripping down his face. "I'm a chuunin! You're just a—"
"A failure?" Naruto finished. "Probably. But you're still losing."
He moved again, faster than Mizuki could track, and delivered a precise strike to the back of the traitor's neck. Mizuki's eyes rolled back, and he collapsed to the ground, unconscious.
Naruto stood over his fallen opponent, feeling... nothing. No triumph. No satisfaction. No vindication. Just the simple acknowledgment that the fight was over and he had won.
The Scroll of Seals lay on the ground where it had fallen from Mizuki's back. Naruto crouched beside it, examining the massive document with detached curiosity.
He could hear the pursuing chuunin getting closer, their shouts carrying through the trees. He had perhaps five minutes before they arrived. Maybe less.
Five minutes wasn't enough time to learn anything meaningful from the scroll.
But it was enough time to copy it.
Naruto formed a hand seal, drawing on skills he had taught himself through trial and error over years of solitary practice. The ability to perfectly memorize anything he read—a skill born from desperation, from needing to extract maximum value from the limited resources available to him. And the ability to transcribe that memory onto paper with perfect accuracy.
He had developed this technique for survival, copying useful information from scrolls and books that he couldn't afford to buy or wasn't allowed to borrow. It wasn't a jutsu, exactly—more like an extreme application of mental discipline and chakra-enhanced cognition.
Naruto unrolled the Scroll of Seals, his eyes scanning the contents at inhuman speed. Technique after technique flowed into his mind, each one catalogued and stored with perfect clarity. Shadow Clone Technique. Multiple Shadow Clone Technique. Rasengan. Flying Thunder God. Edo Tensei. Dead Demon Consuming Seal.
Forbidden jutsu, one after another, each more powerful and dangerous than the last.
His hand moved in parallel, a brush appearing from his equipment pouch along with a blank scroll he always carried. The brush flew across the paper, transcribing everything he read with mechanical precision.
Three minutes. Four. The sounds of the pursuing chuunin grew louder.
Naruto finished the last stroke just as voices became distinct enough to make out words. He rolled up his copied scroll and sealed it into a storage seal on his forearm—another self-taught skill, born from the need to hide valuables from thieves and vandals.
Then he stood, rolled the original Scroll of Seals back to its closed position, and waited.
The chuunin arrived seconds later, bursting into the clearing with weapons drawn. They stopped short when they saw the scene before them—Mizuki unconscious on the ground, the Scroll of Seals apparently intact, and a twelve-year-old boy standing calmly in the middle of it all.
"What—Naruto?!" One of the chuunin, a man with a bandana covering his hair, lowered his weapon slightly. "What happened here?"
"Mizuki attempted to flee with the Scroll of Seals," Naruto reported, his voice carrying no particular emotion. "I intercepted him and rendered him unconscious. The scroll appears to be undamaged."
The chuunin exchanged glances, clearly struggling to process this information. A failed Academy student had single-handedly captured a traitor chuunin and recovered a stolen artifact of immense value?
"You... you did this?" Another chuunin asked, gesturing at Mizuki's unconscious form. "By yourself?"
"Yes."
More confused glances. One of the chuunin—a woman with short brown hair—stepped forward to examine Mizuki, checking his pulse and injuries.
"He's alive," she confirmed. "Broken wrist, probable concussion from blunt force trauma to the back of the head. Nothing life-threatening." She looked up at Naruto with an expression that mingled suspicion with reluctant respect. "You did this to a chuunin?"
"He was overconfident and predictable," Naruto said. "It wasn't difficult."
The bandana-wearing chuunin shook his head slowly. "We need to report this to the Hokage. All of it." He pointed at two of his companions. "You two, secure the prisoner. You—" he pointed at the brown-haired woman, "—take the scroll back to the vault. I'll escort Naruto to the Hokage Tower."
Naruto didn't object. He had expected to be brought before the village leadership eventually—either as a suspect in the theft, or as a witness, or in this case, apparently as the one who had stopped it. The outcome made little difference to him.
As they walked toward the Hokage Tower, the chuunin kept shooting glances at Naruto, clearly trying to reconcile the flat, expressionless boy beside him with the apparently skilled fighter who had taken down a traitor.
"That was... impressive," the man said finally, his tone uncertain. "What you did back there. Most genin couldn't have handled a chuunin like that, let alone an Academy student."
Naruto said nothing.
"Where did you learn to fight like that? The Academy doesn't teach those kinds of skills."
"I taught myself."
"Taught yourself?" The chuunin's eyebrows rose. "How?"
"Practice. Observation. Trial and error." Naruto's voice remained flat. "When you spend enough time being hunted, you learn to be the hunter instead."
The chuunin fell silent, something uncomfortable flickering across his face. Whether it was guilt, or shame, or simply not knowing how to respond, Naruto couldn't tell and didn't particularly care.
They walked the rest of the way in silence.
The Hokage's office was exactly as Naruto remembered from his few previous visits—cluttered with paperwork, smelling faintly of pipe smoke, dominated by the large desk behind which sat the oldest man in the village.
Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage, looked up as Naruto was escorted in. His aged face showed surprise, then concern, then something more complex as the chuunin delivered his report.
"You captured Mizuki yourself?" the old man asked, his voice carrying the weight of decades of experience. "And recovered the Scroll of Seals?"
"Yes," Naruto confirmed.
"How did you know where to find him?"
"I saw him from my window. He was being pursued across the rooftops. I calculated his trajectory and intercepted him in the forest beyond the east gate."
The Hokage studied him for a long moment, pipe held loosely in one hand. There was something in his gaze—sadness, perhaps, or regret. The same expression he had worn during their few previous interactions, as if looking at Naruto caused him pain.
"That was very brave of you," Sarutobi said finally. "And very dangerous. Mizuki was a chuunin. He could have killed you."
"He tried."
"And yet you defeated him."
"Yes."
Another long silence. The Hokage took a slow draw from his pipe, exhaling a cloud of fragrant smoke.
"I've received reports about today's graduation exam," he said, changing the subject with apparent casualness. "Specifically, about your performance. You passed everything except the clone technique."
Naruto nodded.
"And I've received... additional reports... about the reaction of certain classmates to your failure. Something about threatening instructors at knifepoint?"
"Satsuki was upset on my behalf. I did not ask her to threaten anyone."
"Satsuki." The Hokage's brow furrowed slightly. "You mean Sasuke?"
"She prefers Satsuki now."
Something flickered in the old man's eyes—confusion, concern, perhaps a note of alarm. But he didn't pursue the topic, instead returning to the matter at hand.
"Iruka was planning to speak to me tomorrow about allowing you an alternative evaluation," Sarutobi said. "Given your exceptional performance in other areas, and the... unique challenges your chakra reserves present for the standard clone technique."
"I'm aware."
"Well." The Hokage leaned back in his chair, a faint smile crossing his weathered face. "I think tonight's events may have rendered that discussion somewhat moot. You've just single-handedly captured a traitor and recovered one of our village's most valuable artifacts. If that doesn't demonstrate your capability as a ninja, I don't know what would."
He opened a drawer in his desk and withdrew something that glinted in the lamplight—a hitai-ate, the metal plate engraved with the leaf symbol of Konoha.
"Congratulations, Naruto," Sarutobi said, holding out the headband. "You've graduated."
Naruto looked at the hitai-ate, noting its presence without any particular feeling. This was what he had been working toward, wasn't it? The goal that had once consumed him, the dream that had driven him through years of failure and rejection?
He took the headband and tied it around his forehead, the motion mechanical and precise.
"Thank you, Hokage-sama," he said, because it seemed like the appropriate response.
If Sarutobi was disappointed by his lack of enthusiasm, he didn't show it. Instead, the old man's eyes lingered on Naruto's face, seeing something there that troubled him.
"Naruto," he said softly, "are you... alright?"
It was the same question Hinata had asked earlier that day. The same question that everyone seemed to want to ask but didn't know how.
"I'm fine," Naruto said.
It was a lie, of course. Or perhaps more accurately, it was a non-answer—a deflection that avoided the real question entirely. But the Hokage seemed to accept it, or at least chose not to push further.
"Very well. Report to the Academy tomorrow morning for team assignments. And Naruto..." He paused, something pained crossing his face. "If you ever need to talk, about anything, my door is always open."
"I understand."
But they both knew he wouldn't take the offer. Some doors, once closed, were very difficult to open again.
Naruto returned to his apartment in the small hours of the morning, the village silent and sleeping around him. The hitai-ate was cold against his forehead, a physical weight that should have meant something but didn't.
He had graduated. He was officially a ninja of Konoha.
And he felt nothing.
But he had something else now—something potentially far more valuable than a headband or a title. The copied Scroll of Seals rested in the storage seal on his forearm, containing dozens of forbidden techniques waiting to be learned.
Naruto sat on his bed, unsealing the scroll and spreading it out before him. The moonlight streaming through his cracked window provided just enough illumination to read by.
He started with the Shadow Clone Technique.
Unlike the regular clone, which created insubstantial illusions, the shadow clone produced solid copies—real, physical duplicates capable of independent action. More importantly, when a shadow clone was dispelled, its memories transferred back to the original.
And it required a large amount of chakra to perform.
Naruto read the technique description carefully, memorizing every detail. The hand seals, the chakra manipulation, the mental focus required to split one's consciousness across multiple bodies.
Then he stood, moved to the center of his small apartment, and formed the seal.
"Shadow Clone Technique."
The chakra drain was immediate and significant—more than any technique he had ever performed. But his reserves were vast, far beyond what a normal person could contain, and the drain barely registered as anything more than minor fatigue.
The results, however, were impressive.
Fifty clones appeared around him, filling his apartment to the point where they had to stand shoulder to shoulder. Fifty identical copies of himself, each one solid and real, each one looking back at him with the same flat, empty expression.
Naruto examined his clones with detached curiosity. They were perfect replicas, down to the last detail. And when he dismissed them with a thought, their memories flooded back into his mind—fifty sets of brief, confused experiences, quickly assimilated and integrated.
Useful. Very useful.
He created a smaller group of clones—ten this time—and set them to studying different sections of the scroll while he focused on the technique that had caught his attention most prominently.
The Rasengan.
According to the scroll, the Rasengan was a technique developed by the Fourth Hokage—a pure manipulation of chakra, compressed and spun into a sphere of devastating power. It required no hand seals, instead relying entirely on chakra control and shape manipulation.
The irony wasn't lost on Naruto. He had failed the clone technique because his chakra control was insufficient for delicate work. And now he was attempting a technique that required the highest levels of control imaginable.
But he had time. He had clones to help him practice. And he had nothing better to do with his sleepless nights.
Dawn found Naruto still practicing, his apartment floor scarred by dozens of failed attempts. The Rasengan was proving as difficult as the scroll had suggested—each attempt resulted in the chakra spiraling out of control, dispersing harmlessly or exploding with enough force to leave small craters.
But he was making progress. Slowly, incrementally, he was learning to feel the chakra, to shape it, to contain its spinning power within the confines of his palm.
His clones had made progress as well. Throughout the night, they had studied and practiced other techniques from the scroll—some successfully, others not. The knowledge they had gained filtered back to him each time a clone was dispelled, building his repertoire of forbidden jutsu one memory at a time.
Flying Thunder God required special seals that he didn't have the materials to create. The Edo Tensei required sacrifices that he wasn't willing to make. But other techniques—elemental manipulation, advanced taijutsu forms, chakra enhancement methods—those were accessible.
When the sun rose fully over Konoha, Naruto was exhausted but not incapable. He had pushed his chakra reserves to their limits and then recovered, repeating the cycle multiple times throughout the night. The experience had taught him the boundaries of his stamina and how to pace himself accordingly.
He was also, he noted with something approaching mild satisfaction, significantly more dangerous than he had been the day before.
Not that it mattered. Power was just a tool, and tools were only valuable when applied to a purpose. Naruto didn't have a purpose—not anymore. Just existence. Just going through the motions because stopping required a decision he didn't care enough to make.
But if he was going to exist, he might as well exist effectively.
He sealed the copied scroll away again, hiding the evidence of his night's work. Then he washed, changed into fresh clothes, and tied his new hitai-ate around his forehead.
Today was team assignments. Today, he would officially begin his career as a ninja of Konoha.
And four girls with impossible figures and inexplicable devotion would be waiting for him at the Academy, ready to continue their mission of breaking through the walls around his heart.
Naruto left his apartment and stepped into the morning light, feeling the warmth of the sun on his skin without feeling anything else.
Another day. Another series of motions to go through.
But somewhere in the void inside him, in that empty space where emotions used to live, a few new things had taken up residence. Not feelings—not yet. Just... tools. Skills. Capabilities.
Power that might someday find a purpose.
Or might not.
Either way, he would keep moving forward.
Because forward was the only direction that existed.